This is the Beginning...

Flying over British Columbia

Rob and his flowers, and the giant TV in our hotel.

YUM! Kim-chi!
So here I am in South Korea. Sitting in a lovely hotel with a fabulous veiw of my new home, Taebaek. After the last week of orientation and being driven around like cattle, relaxing in a hotel is a nice way to spend the weekend. We have wandered around Taebaek a little bit, taking in the sights and trying to figure out what everything is. I think Rob and I have learned some compassion for people in a foreign land. Talking louder does not facilitate comprehension... keep that in mind when talking to someone who doesn't speak your language. Charades usually works, and it makes people laugh... :)

Taebaek is a small city, by Korean standards, with a population of 55,000 people. It is nestled in a valley within the Taebaeksen (Taebaek Mountains). The name of the province translates as ‘huge and stunning.’No argument here. There is a nice little pond here called Hwangji Pond. It is the source of the Nakdong River, which is 428km long and 5,000 tons of water flows out daily.

In other news, we have seen our new apartment, which is just beautiful and larger than what we expected. It has three bedrooms, a living room, and a kitchen. The other day two teachers from my school took us shopping for accessories to put in our apartment. I'm talking everything from furniture, to curtains, to kitchen appliances... They wanted to buy us a lot, but we tried to turn down many of their offers. I guess this is the governments' initiative to spend money on foreign teachers, to entice them into staying for longer than a year. Really, they are treating us very well, taking us to dinner and making sure we are happy.
We are very fortunate that our experience thus far has been so positive.

Tomorrow I go to my new school, to meet all the staff and students, and on Tuesday I start teaching. Rob is lucky in that he doesn't have to teach for another week yet. He gets a whole week to prepare... I'm jealous.